Hi guys. Have you been enjoying my Natural Selection 2 guides? I hope that they have been helping you out in what is one of the most fun, yet most complex and daunting games I’ve ever played. Today, I’m giving you a few quick tips concerning the Marines. While at first glance they seem like your every-day FPS standard space marines, playing Natural Selection 2’s Frontiersmen has a few nuances that you must learn. Enjoy!
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TRANSCRIPT:
Hey guys, today I’m going to give you a couple of quick tips for Natural Selection 2’s Frontiersmen, particularly in the early game stage.
First off, walking backwards is a pretty bad idea. You walk backwards at half speed and you can’t sprint. If you need to retreat and are worried about someone coming up behind you, it’s much better to sprint forwards and occasionally turn around quickly to have a look behind you.
When attacking a harvester, kill the cyst first! With the cyst killed, the infestation will recede and the harvester will start to take damage, meaning that even if you die, you might still take out the harvester with you.
On that, kill cysts! Killing cysts is extremely annoying to the Alien commander. Breaking ‘chains’, by hitting cysts some way up the line is particularly annoying, because it halts his ability to build structures in any area serviced by the chain. Make newly built cysts a priority. Fresh cysts are a lot easier to kill than mature ones, usually only taking two or three axe swings.
Your wielder is great for killing cysts, but not so great for killing structures. When attacking a structure, drop the wielder by pressing G and use your axe. Your welder also repairs power nodes much faster than just pressing ‘E’. Make sure you switch to it.
Whenever building structures, try to give yourself as big of a field of view as possible. If you are alone, STOP BUILDING the second you hear the pitter patter of little skulk feet. Try to keep ambush points, such as vents, in your sights at all time.
When being swarmed by skulks, try to move unpredictably. Sprint, jump, and run in circles. Switch to your pistol if you run out of ammo – especially if they are retreating – it is very accurate. Turn off your flashlight! Unless you desperately need it to see in the dark, such as in rooms where you have lost power, or to look down vents, keep it off. It’s a pretty big giveaway to the aliens.
Mines are a fantastically underused early-game purchase. You can use them to lock down a resource node so you don’t have to expend manpower to defend it. Put the mines near the power node, or near the vents, especially in hard-to-see places.
Lastly, as an Exo, you can kill eggs by walking over them! This is probably the most helpful tip when sieging an enemy base, as stepping on an egg instantly kills it, meaning you can clear a hive of eggs while still being able to focus more important structures with your guns.
Ok, that’s all for now. If you have some more tips please let me know in the comments!
Natural Selection 2 is available through the Steam store or through GameFanShop. If you liked Steve’s article be sure to check out his “Natural Selection 2 – Alien Commander guide” and his “Natural Selection 2 impressions!“
